


Pearls

by lokelios



Category: Death Note
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, M/M, mermaid au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-08 22:49:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3226394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lokelios/pseuds/lokelios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Near is finally of age to go up to the surface above the sea. However, when he finally does go up there and encounters a human on land- his life changes from then on. [AU fic, also first ever fanfic on AO3. may be OOC on some parts]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Curiosity

**Author's Note:**

> Okay! So this is my first Death Note fanfic [actually it's the first fanfic I've ever posted onto AO3], but this fanfic was based off an AU idea me and a friend had about Near being a merboy and meeting Mello [who is a human in this AU]. chapters may be fast or slow, depending on how much time I have, but I'll do my best to make this fic enjoyable and make sure I'll finish it as well!

Another pearl was added.  
These days it seemed harder and harder to find them. At least it was for most beings of his kind.

But not for Near.

He was always easily able to find pearls, especially those of different colors. He usually found pearls every day somehow, and he'd put them to use. However that use was only putting the pearls on a string as though it was some sort of piece of jewelry- only it was never circled around like a piece of jewelry would be. Making this string of pearls was something he had done since he was young, and now- when he's about 18 years of age, he was still adding pearls and making this string longer, however his string was still rather small than one would think- and it would have been longer if he didn't have to start over due to an incident that happened when he was 13, but that was long ago and the fact that he even had a pearl string now was enough to relieve him.

These days he often found himself staring up at the water's surface. He was curious about the world above the sea, however he was never usually allowed to go up there; for when he was younger, those of his kind that were under his age now were forbidden to go up there, and even though Near was now of age to see the other world, he couldn't help but feel hesitant. He was always told to be careful, that if he weren't careful, he'd be hunted by the beings up there known as humans.

But he was curious, and he intended to see what the world was like above the water he had lived in his entire life. The sun had already disappeared and the moon had come to illuminate the sky, maybe at a time like this he could go up there without being seen.

He balled up his string into his hand, keeping it for luck of some sort before he began to move up, but at a slow pace. Little by little, he was closer to another world, with every move of his body he would then be a part of that other world. 

He raised his free hand now, just centimeters from the edge of the waves.

One little push of his hand, and he'll be able to push himself past the barrier that separated him from his home to a new discovery for him.

And he made that push, he was no longer under the sea now. His dark eyes grew wide when he felt the new sensation of the surface's wind brushing past his face and hair, and the droplets of water clinging to his skin crawling off of him and back into the waves. The world above the sea, to actually see it the way humans see it... It was amazing to him. He glanced upwards to see the sky, for once seeing it a completely different way from when he saw it down below.

Now that he was up here, he didn't want to go back underwater.

He swam toward a boulder that was closer to the shore of the nearby beach and stuck out from the tide before he leaned against it, providing himself some sort of relaxation as he continued to gaze at the new world before him. He found he was not only near a beach, but what seemed like a town. The buildings still lit up in the night fascinated the young boy; the dry, crisp wind, the sky from this view, everything was new to him- and as of yet, he was enjoying seeing every bit of it.

Until he heard what seemed like footsteps, and when Near's eyes turned toward the beach, he was met with a blue pair of eyes staring at his own. Those blue eyes belonged to a young blond man in a jacket.

A human.

He had been spotted by a human.


	2. Meeting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay!! This is the 2nd chapter of the fic- and this one is more of Mello's point of view- and i'm sorry in advance if it seems like Mello is a little OOC!

Of all things he expected to see when he came out here at this night. Of all things when Mello was finally able to dress comfortably and sneak out of the place he lived in-

Mello wasn't expecting to see a young boy swimming alone, and _during the season of fall, too._

Wait, why was this kid swimming at this time? And why was he alone?  
"...What are you doing here?" was the first thing he said to the boy in the water. Only to get a response for what felt like 5 minutes after he asked.

"...Swimming." The white haired boy finally responded, his voice was quiet.

"Well yeah, I can see that, but what are you doing here alone?" Mello asked, he was already beginning to feel annoyed with this kid. "Where's your mom?"

At that, the other's eyes pointed downward. It took him yet again another while to respond.  
"...She's gone." He spoke before he slunk himself off of the boulder he was resting against, "She's been gone for a long time now."

"Okay then..." Mello took a small breath, "What about the rest of your family then, surely you gotta have some family member with you around here."

He saw the boy sink a bit lower underwater, "...I've never even met them..." he answered.

Then it finally clicked in Mello's mind, this kid was an orphan, just like he was.  
"...I see." The blond replied before he sat down on the dry sand. "I've never met mine, either."

Once he said that, he noticed the boy in the water staring at him in a peculiar way, as though he was surprised to hear what he said- that was before he saw the boy come closer to the beach, but not coming out of the water.

He swims a little strange, it made Mello wonder how long he had even been in there.

"You know. You're gonna get sick if you keep swimming in there at this time of the year, especially at night." Mello informed the other.

"I'll be fine." The swimming boy replied, "I've been around water my whole life, I know what I'm doing."

"How long have you even been here?"

"Since this morning."

"You should really get out of there, then."

"I told you, I'll be fine."

At that, the blond gave a frustrated sigh. "Fine then, suit yourself." He pulled a chocolate bar from his pocket and unwrapped the foil around the treat. He noticed the white haired boy staring at the bar.

"...What's that?" The boy asked, Mello stared at him. Didn't this kid know what chocolate was?

"It's chocolate, you know what chocolate is, right?" The older boy asked, adding a sarcastic tone. But he got a head shake from the other boy.

"...Are you serious?" He then asked, getting a nod from the younger one.

"There's no such thing as chocolate where I'm from." the white haired boy informed him, Mello almost choked on the chocolate piece in his mouth.

"Wherever you live must miss out on a lot of things if there's no such thing as chocolate, there."

"There are a lot of things this place has that my home doesn't."

"Jesus, I can't imagine living in a place like that."

"I've grown with it, so to me, this place is something completely new to me."

"Well, here." Mello broke off a piece of his chocolate bar and handed it to the other. "It's probably not the best idea to eat it when you're in water like that, though."

"I've eaten a lot of food while in water, I'll be okay." the white haired boy replied before he hesitantly placed the piece of chocolate in his mouth. The boy's eyes widened when the taste of the treat filled his mouth.

"...It's sweet."

"Is that a good thing for you?"

The younger boy nodded.

"Well, that's good then." Mello replied before he bit off another piece of the chocolate. "So, what's your name?"

"...It's Near." The white haired boy replied, "What about yours?"

"Mello." The blond replied, he couldn't use his real name toward this kid, not until he knew him better.

"...What about your age?" the boy he now knew as Near asked.

"I'm twenty, what about you?"

"I'm eighteen."  
Mello almost choked on his chocolate again.

"Eighteen!?" He repeated, earning a nod from Near, "You look like you're fucking twelve...!"

He got a shrug in response, "I've been told a lot that I seem young for my age, but it doesn't change the fact that I _am_ eighteen."

Mello leaned back a little, at that. "Shit, at least you're aging well."

The blond looked down to see Near's hand now out of the water, however, that was only part of what caught his eye.  
Upon looking at the hand he had noticed that... The boy's fingers didn't look clammy for being in water so long.

"...Have you really been in the water since this morning?" He got a nod in response. "Then why aren't your fingers looking clammy?"

"What?" He heard Near ask, seeing the younger tilt his head a little.

"Why isn't your skin clammy? You know, like how your fingers look all clammy in the water after a while- c'mon it happens to every human being who swims." However once he had finished saying that, he saw Near's face turn pale.

There was a long silence between them before Mello saw near look up at him and speak in a quiet voice.

"...Can you keep a secret...?"

Mello took a small while to respond, but he nodded. But he mentally crossed his fingers, whatever secret this is- it had to be good. And for something this interesting, well, he would want to tell it to _someone._

However, that was when he watched the younger boy as he moved farther away from the blond and more into the ocean.

Then his eyes widened and the chocolat bar fell from his hand as he saw the white tail appear from the waves of the water and into the air of the land above the sea.


	3. Thinking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhh!! I'm so sorry this one took me so long, I've been having some small motivation problems and I've been trying to get some good ideas to keep the story going, but here's chapter 3!!

"H-Holy shit..."  
Mello was shocked at what he had seen. Of all things he could have figured up about the boy- Being a merman definitely wasn't one of them.

He leaned forward a little, taking a closer look at the tail and examining the scales in it. The scales were a pearly white and seemed to have a slight iridescent to it. The end of the tail was flowing and smooth, it moved along with the waves perfectly. In the blonde's opinion, it was quite beautiful if he were honest.

"...You're a fucking merman...!?" Mello finally spoke up, startling the white haired one due to his outburst.

"Well, I'm still called a merboy until I hit the age of twenty." Near then replied, before he lowered his tail back into the sea, making it disappear from the elder's sight.

At that, Mello ran his hand through his hair.  
"Jesus, of all things I could've come up with, I never suspected you'd be that. I thought mermaids didn't even exist."

"There are a lot of things in the world that are believed to be nonexistent, my example is different colored pearls." The albino looked away, a small gleam had begun to appear in his eyes once he spoke about them, "Merpeople used to think that the only color of pearl there was, was only white. But then many years back it turns out there are more than just white pearls out there."

"Well, I've never seen any other colored pearl."

"They're hard to find, but I have seen some for myself."

"Do you have any with you?"

Near didn't answer to that directly.  
"Not right now." he lied, "But maybe some other time."

"Alright, fair enough." Mello went back to his normal sitting position.  
"So... Does your kind legitimately bring humans down to the bottom of the sea and eat them?"

"Well, I wouldn't be so sure about the 'bottom of the sea' part, considering the intensity down there is even too much for us, but... I have heard some drag humans underwater and devour them. But I'm not one of those." Near informed him, leaning against the boulder adjacent to the shore again.  
"I take it that means you don't know any, either."  
"Right."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After that, the two boys continued to converse and know each other, however once the sun had begun to come up, Near had to say goodbye.

"So wait, will I see you again?" The white haired merboy heard the other male ask.

"..It depends, will you come back here at night?"

"Will you?"

"Yes."

"Then yes."

After that, the two of them parted ways. Near returned to the world of his below the waves and returned to the spot where he was placing the colored pearls onto his string, luckily the small pile of pearls he left there were still there. During his process of placing the pearls on the string, he began to think about the next meeting with the human, granted he had a small bit of anxiety over the possibility that Mello may not actually return to the beach, but then again- with the human's choice of words, the possibility of him not going back were very low.

He had begun to think a lot more about the human, about what he'd like, what he did with his life, topics as such. But he had also begun to think about what Mello could teach him, Near knew little to nothing about the human world- so maybe Mello could teach him everything there was to know about that place, and in return; Near would teach him about his underwater home.

Near was eventually snapped out of his thoughts when he heard a voice speak to him.

"So, who is he?"

The white haired merboy quickly turned toward the owner of the voice, and he was met with black hair and a pair of dark eyes similar to his own.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mello quickly headed toward his room inside of the building, the last thing he wanted to deal with was to be caught by his caretaker or anyone else who lived in the place. Once inside of his bedroom he pushed the door closed with one last 'click' before he stripped himself of his jacket, he placed the article of clothing on top of his dresser before he went to lay himself onto his bed.

His mind began to wander back to the merboy he saw earlier. Up until then, he always thought creatures he read in books like that never existed, now, he wondered what else had actually existed other than mermaids. There was more to think about when he thought of Near, the younger male's white hair, his dark eyes, his small frame and pale skin... Mello wondered if he got cold easily.

with that thought striking an idea in his head, he quickly shot up from his bed and went back to his dresser, he rummaged through most of the drawers and articles of clothing before he found what he was looking for.

An old white pajama shirt.

It was too small for the blond now, but he figured if he could give it to Near- maybe the merboy would be a little less cold if he were to go anywhere that'd be particulary cold.

Like Antarctica, maybe.

It was then Mello had heard his bedroom door open and a voice had spoken to him.

"Mello, were you outside?"

Shit. He'd been caught after all, and by the person he really didn't want to speak to; Roger.

"...Only for a few minutes." He answered.

"Where did you go?"

"Down to the beach, Roger, no one saw me. Even if they did they wouldn't have known it was me."

"...Are you sure?"

"I'd know if someone was around, Roger. I'm not an idiot."

"I'm aware of that, Mello. I just happened to notice that you weren't here earlier, and I had wondered where you left, for I don't want anything happening to you. No one here does."

"I get it. Now can you please leave me alone?" Mello was sick and tired of having to go through this, this wasn't the first time he has a conversation like this with Roger, and it definitelly wouldn't be the last.

"...Alright." Was the last thing Roger had replied with before he left, closing the door on his way out.

Mello let out one more sigh before he folded up the pajama shirt he found and rested it next to his jacket. He was sure not to forget it.


	4. Just a notice

I just wanted to say that I'm sorry I haven't updated this story! But for those who are following the story, I won't be dropping the story, don't worry! Im just having a lot of motivation problems anflld I've also been busy due to school.

However, because summer break is really soon for me, I plan on uploading the next chapter of this story real soon. So please sit tight for just a little longer!!


End file.
